So, for example, if you run an email campaign for three days offering a 25% discount, you can track the behavior of users who used the discount during this period.

If the users you reached with your campaign performed better for your target metric, this is a solid indicator that it was effective in reaching the kind of traffic and customers you want.

3. Learn about e-commerce shopping habits

One of the best features of the Cohort Analysis report is the inclusion of e-commerce-specific data, including revenue per user, transactions per user, total revenue.

Looking at transactions per user by acquisition date can show the average amount of time it takes for a user to make a purchase.

In the following report, for example, purchases spiked five days after the acquisition date.

Of course, it’s important to consider factors that could’ve caused this spike, like a promotion or remarketing campaign.

But this data can give you a stronger understanding of your audience’s purchasing behavior and the average time it takes them to make a decision.

You can also take things a step further by cross-referencing this data with the Lifetime Value (LTV) report.

For example, let’s say you notice in a cohort analysis that over the span of a 12-week campaign, you saw significant drop-offs in user retention in weeks five and 11.

You can hop over to the LTV report for the same time frame, then determine if there are any channels or campaigns seeing the same low-performing weeks.

To access this data, select LifeTime Value from the Audience menu.

Then, you’ll need to decide which metric you want to use to determine the value of your users. For e-commerce sites, this will likely be revenue per user.

Then, you can sort your data by acquisition channel, source, medium, or campaign.

This can give you an idea of which channels you need to improve to eliminate drop-offs in site performance and increase your user retention and revenue.

4. Use annotations to monitor impact

As you analyze your cohort reports, it’s essential to keep in mind any factors that could be impacting the data you see.

Fortunately, you can make annotations to keep track of these factors and easily see the dates of specific events, campaigns, and site changes.

For example, the following chart shows three significant events for a company’s marketing efforts.

In this case, it shows the date on which the agency had an article published on a third-party platform.

A few days later, they saw a significant jump in traffic.

And while this could be confusing while looking at the cohort analysis report alone, the annotation ensures that users looking at this data don’t forget to consider that significant factor and analyze the data accordingly.

5. Save reports for your most important cohorts

If you plan to use the Cohort Analysis feature frequently, saving your reports is an excellent way to save time.

It also ensures that you’re consistently looking at the same data sets so that you don’t draw any inaccurate conclusions simply because a setting in your report is slightly different.

You can save a report by clicking the “Save” button at the top of your dashboard and creating a name.

This will keep all customizations intact, including advanced segments, secondary dimensions, and sorting — so that the next time you want to use the cohort analysis feature, you won’t need to waste any time recreating your data set.

Conclusion

Drawing actionable conclusions from Google Analytics data can be challenging, even for experienced marketers.

The amount of data the platform provides is extremely valuable — but the sheer volume can make it difficult to sort through the noise and find the metrics you can use to improve your site’s performance.

So if you’re looking for a way to segment your data into more manageable chunks, the cohort analysis feature is a great way to focus in on specific subsets of your audience.

You can use it to learn more about segments you’ve already created and see how their behavior differs from other segments, as well as your site’s traffic as a whole.

It’s also useful for gauging responses to specific campaigns, learning more about e-commerce shoppers’ behavior, and monitoring the impact of any other significant events related to your business.

And considering how underutilized this report is, you can consider it your secret weapon for analyzing your site’s performance and gaining the kind of insight that your competitors might be missing out on.